Tag Archive: mead

Brew Day: Vampire Dust Pale Ale and a Mead

Yesterday (at the time of writing) was Mead Day. Since I’m down to just a session wheat beer, I needed a pale ale, and I just wanted to make a mead.

Strike Water Additions

Crushed malt

Redneck RIMS setup

Brewing went off with mostly few hitches except slowly hitting my strike temperature due to this redneck RIMS setup (to be documented further later).

Batch Size	Boil Time	IBU	SRM	Est. OG	Est. FG	ABV
5.5 gal	60 min	44.9 IBUs	5.2 SRM	1.059	1.011	6.3 %
			Actuals	1.054	1.01	5.8 %

Name	Cat.	OG Range	FG Range	IBU	SRM	Carb	ABV
American Pale Ale	18 B	1.045 - 1.06	1.01 - 1.015	30 - 50	5 - 10	2.3 - 3	4.5 - 6.2 %

Name	Amount	%
Brewer's Malt, 2-Row, Premium (Great Western)	11 lbs	90.72
Carapils (Briess)	12 oz	6.19
Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L	6 oz	3.09

Name	Amount	Time	Use	Form	Alpha %
Green Bullet	0.5 oz	60 min	Boil	Pellet	13.5
Citra	1 oz	15 min	Boil	Pellet	12
Citra	1 oz	5 min	Boil	Pellet	12
Citra	3 oz	7 days	Dry Hop	Pellet	12

Name	Amount	Time	Use	Type
Irish Moss	1.00 tsp	15 min	Boil	Fining

Name	Lab	Attenuation	Temperature
London Ale Yeast (1028)	Wyeast Labs	75%	60°F - 72°F

Step	Temperature	Time
Mash In	148°F	60 min

This is the fist time I’ve attempted mead, and I tried to keep it as simple as I can:

Ingredients: 4 lb Orange Blossom Honey, water to make 1g, yeast, LD Carlson Yeast Nutrient and LD Carlson Yeast Energizer

Yeast: Lavlin 71b, 5g

Process:

Rehydrate yeast with 125 ml water and 6.25g LD Carlson Yeast Nutrient

Add all honey to fermenter, water to 1 gallon, mix well. Pitch yeast. Forget to add first SNA (oops).

34 Brix!

2 * 2lb Orange Blossom Honey… from Ohio?

Supplies. Putting the Mr. Beer into use.

Following morning: add first two SNA’s, mostly because I don’t have a way to measure to tenths of grams.

The SNAs should be 0.4g Nutrient and 0.2g Energizer each addition, at pitch and at each of 24, 48, and 72 hours post-pitch.

Vampire Dust Pale should be ready in 10 days or so, the mead will be a while.

Cheers!